The funds are finite

Many smokers are arrogant and snub their noses at the medical establishment attempting to tell them they should quit, because it's nobody's business but their own. Then they come begging for help, when they are having an attack of pneumonia or COPD. Not to mention they would sue for malpractice if they didn't recover well from surgery. Many physicians will not perform surgery on smokers due to their poor recovery...I should say surgeons who are good and can be selective about who they treat. It's a joke -smokers going to Dr after Dr because they don't feel well, and Dr's who are greedy just keep selling them pills. Another answer is to jack up the tobacco taxes high enough to pay for all of this BS. Smoking being hard to quit...Yes well resisting habits and indulgences is hard for everyone. Smoking is not impossible to quit, people quit everyday, of course big tobacco wants everyone to think it is impossible to quit. While we're at it, lets not give any health care to those who make and market tobacco!

A matter of choice

Tax payers should not pay for treatment of patients with illnesses linked to smoking. A person that willingly put themselves in harms way by smoking should pay for their own treatment. Why should other people pay for someones utter stupidity? And also not giving healthcare to smokers will be an effective deterrent to young people concidering taking up the habit.

Yes they should

Smokers should be denied state healthcare because they are knowingly doing something very bad for their body. Smoking is going to cause health issues down the road and therefore since the person is knowingly doing it they should not have access to state healthcare. They should have to go elsewhere to receive their healthcare.

Why should I save you from killing yourself you chose it

Firstly, I find it very stupid when tax payers have for other people's stupid choice, you are taught in PHSE about drugs and alcohol also it says that smoking on the packet of the ciga but you chose to be ignorant like there are other ways to slowly kill yourself faster than whats killing you. People double shifts earn a lot of money have to pay bills, buy basic necessities for children and themselves but then to find out that money will be given as tax for people who have kids and who is inconsiderate. Why the fuck should I be paying you chose to die so die, If your excuse is that you are going through a rough time get some help because in this world you have to be independent and make your own choices, think of it at a young age you are taught about smoking and other self inflicted stuff right so why choose that path. The right to life you deprived yourself of that so why should someone help you when you were in your correct mindset so choose but you chose wrongly

It's not only them it effects

Second-hand smoke is worse for your body than smoking a cigarette. This is a well known fact and people continue to smoke and disregard the health of those around them. Restricting health care access is about deterring bad behaviour, not punishing it. If we can Persuade people to stop smoking by cutting back their benefits and health care, we won't only be saving their lives but saving the lives of people who are actively doing the right thing.

More discouragement needed against smoking.

As a person reaches a certain age ( usually young ) they may start smoking. Countless reasons exist for this, mainly illogical. We cannot ignore the fact that the majority of people that smoke are lower class ; the government receives very little revenues from them , if not having to support them on social benefits. How can we ask the common professional, who may be strongly opposed to smoking , to pay the bills brought on by another, independent adult's mistakes ?

All choices have Repercussions.

One who chooses to ignore their own health should simply be ignored by health care providers. CVD accounted for 1200 million deaths in the 20th century. We have identified the risk factors (i.E. Smoking). We can prevent further prevalence of this atrocity. If one chooses to smoke they choose to forfeit healthcare. Smoking is still "a BASIC human right" or, at least a to choice to do so. Just like walking in to traffic or drinking bleach. Marketing it as "a BASIC human right" does not justify the stupidity underlying that choice.

Why are we paying for their own choices?

The money that we get given for our hard work is going to pay for the people who are damaging their own bodies, if they choose to smoke, they need to realise that this will harm your body, and they need to know that other people are not going to want to spend their own money what they have earned on you and what you have done to your own body. If I kept my lights on my my house, id have to pay for the bill, I wouldn't expect everyone else to pay for it, because I was the one to do that, so id have to suffer the consequence. If I stole something id go to jail, if I eat something that was out of date id be sick, if I if I jumped off a cliff there is that huge percent that I would probably die, or most likely injure myself. Everything comes with consequences. So why when people smoke, when people harm their own bodies by doing this, do they think we are going to pay for their mistake, it was their choice to smoke, their own consequence and problems down the road for them, not us.

Tax payers money should be spent wisely

I work so hard for my money and of course pay uncle Sam his dues every year. Its painful to imagine that while I choose to avoid smoking for its terrible effects on health, I am forced to pay someone's hospital bill or maintain their health issues as a results of smoking.

Let them rot!

They're wasting their lives away. And they expect us to help them. Soon as they're feeling better, they'll go for some more puffs and get sick again and come back begging us to get them out of the situation they put themselves in. Why should we waste our efforts on them?

Some facts for the naysayers:

Conclusion: Smokers don't just pay for themselves WHOLLY, they pay for 6.7 other people as well.

Fact 3 (report published in Public Library of Science, 2012): Over a lifetime, non-smoking non-obese people cost the taxpayer MORE in healthcare. It has been posited that this is because as they live longer, they are no longer working (so no longer contributing to the coffers), and the ailments that afflict our elderly cost the same, if not more, then the ailments that afflict smokers.

Smokers are humans

Yes, smoking does harm the body, but it is just one of the optimal life choices some people tend to choose. Making people who smoke pay for their healthcare is absurd; its just like making men who leave their wife and children pay. Will you not treat them unless they go back the their children!

Why just smokers?

Why shouldn't anybody who puts themselves into danger of harm pay there own way? Drunks, drivers who break the law speeding etc, drug takers. Extreme sports people, skate boarders etc. Don't even get me started on people who over indulge in sugary soft drink, junk food and just generally don't look after themselves. We could then start on they people who intentionally cause other people harm. All or nothing I say,

I would put forward

That there are more non smokers than smokers in hospitals , so maybe we should make the non smokers pay for there own treatment .I have been a smoker for 60 years and have never had hospital treatment and do not take phamaceutical drugs .The real answer is nutrition .

No THEY SHOULD NOT.

It never ceases to amaze me how stupid people are. They say smokers shouldn't get state healthcare, cause non-smokers shouldn't have to pay for it. What they don't want to tell you is that smokers pay a very high tax on cigarettes and the majority of that tax goes to pay THEIR state healthcare. Sounds to me like the smokers are paying for the NON-smokers healthcare. If you consider smokers are denied some treatments cause they smoke. Yet the taxes that they pay go for the same treatment for non-smokers. So in actuality its the smokers paying for the non-smokers healthcare not just the other way around. Don't forget to consider this, if they all quit tomorrow then your sorry asses would have to pay for your own healthcare. Provided you can't find a fat drunk somewhere to subsidize the off-set of them quitting. Seriously people instead of blindly listening to other people and dumb ass politicians, how about you do some research on your own. It might save you from looking like a total idiot. But to be fair to all, both smokers and non-smokers pay for healthcare. The only difference is smokers are in fact denied some treatment options. To me this is an outrage because they not only pay income tax, food and grocery tax, they also pay those very large cigarette taxes that go to the healthcare system that they can use so little of.

They shouldn't be denied it, just denied it free

I do not agree with smoking, but I don't think that any smoker should be denied state healthcare. If someone who smokes needs treatment for anything BECAUSE they smoke, then they should have to pay for it. However, denying them of any free state healthcare because they smoke is ridiculous.

Why do we only try cut out smokers?

39% of Australians smoke but 50% of Australians are obese and 60+ Australians drink alchahol above the safety limits. Why do we exclude smokers when these people are also endangering their lives. We shoyldn't exclude smokers. We should help these people get back to a better health state, instead of practically forcing them to die by taking away their human right to the public health system!!!!!

People are allowed to make mistakes and we should forgive them!

If people made the mistake to smoke early on in their lives why should they now have to pay by having a human right denied by the government. People can smoke! It's legal! The government made it legal and the government made the public health system! Why can't people have the best of both worlds!!!!

It's a BASIC human right

What if they injure themselves by other means, like by falling over and fracturing their wrist? Surely they should be aloud health care for that even if they do smoke that's a non-smoking related injury. It's a basic human right. That's like saying that a child is not allowed to go to the hospital because he ate some lollies.

Where will it end?

If smokers are denied access to free healthcare them where willit end? Will people who enjoy extreme sports be denied access to healthcare because of the danger of that sport? Smoking is an addiction and often a coping mechanism for many, healthcare should not be withheld. Education and stop smoking programmes should be encouraged and the person should be helped to stop smoking rather than saying you've made your bed now lie in it!!!